A treasury of eclectic information about different varieties of roses looks at the stories behind their colorful names, probing elements of folklore, poetry, art, literature, science, myth, and other sources to reveal the history of naming and cultivating roses, from ancient times to the present day.

‘Fascinating...I’ll never look at a rose in quite the same way again.’ Adrian Tinniswood The rose is bursting with meaning. Over the centuries it has come to represent love and sensuality, deceit, death and the mystical unknown. Today the rose enjoys unrivalled popularity across the globe, ever present at life’s seminal moments. Grown in the Middle East two thousand years ago for its pleasing scent and medicinal properties, it has become one of the most adored flowers across cultures, no longer selected by nature, but by us. The rose is well-versed at enchanting human hearts. From Shakespeare’s sonnets to Bulgaria’s Rose Valley to the thriving rose trade in Africa and the Far East, via museums, high fashion, Victorian England and Belle Epoque France, we meet an astonishing array of species and hybrids of remarkably different provenance. This is the story of a hardy, thorny flower and how, by beauty and charm, it came to seduce the world.

This book is intended to be an aid to moving people from racist to non-racist to anti-racist. I am writing this book for people who want to be change agents in the area of racial justice. I am writing this book for true patriots, who want the best for America. This book isn't written to teach the reader about slavery, Jim Crow, Black History or the history of the civil rights movement. There are plenty of well written books, written by very dedicated and detailed historians, who can make a reader a walking wealth of historical civil rights information. Some may say, in order to fix the future, we must know and understand the past. To a certain degree, I agree. But living in the historical, can sometimes prevent action towards improving the future. I decided to teach people the difference between a racist, a non-racist and an anti-racist. Here's why; the lack of understanding and defining who is a racist, a non-racist and an anti-racist; has always been a dagger sticking through the heart of America. This lack of admitting, knowing, understanding and defining racism has been one of the biggest obstacles keeping America from realizing its true potential and obligation to provide equality to all its citizens. Also, the lack of admitting, knowing, understanding and defining racism is a major reason why America cannot rid itself of racism. And ifAmerica doesn't understand what racism is, and deal with it once and for all, America will eventually commit social suicide. So, who will this book help? We have many important social situations going on in America. People are dealing with healthcare issues. People are becoming aware that the top one percent of Americans own ninety percent of America's wealth. Americans are realizing that the American Dream has all but disappeared. But, believe me when I say, ahead of them all, is racism; and it has dominated America since the first Europeans sailed here and settled in a place and called it Jamestown in 1607. Racism is why they quickly massacred the native people. Racism allowed them to buy, steal and sell Africans into slavery. Racism was the catalyst behind forcing the Chinese to work the railroads and live in underground cities. Racism put Japanese people into internment camps and stole their property. Within the words of America's documents of freedom and sown within the fabric of the America's institutions and flag, is a powerful ideology called racism. It dwells smack dab in the heart of social and civic justice, education, religion, health and financial wealth. Racism continues to chug along throughout American society like a locomotive, purposely set to steamroll anyone who isn't the right color. Racism never gets fixed because Americans have been taught to not truly understand it or speak freely about it. Racism never gets fixed because anyone with a pair of lips and a tongue thinks and speaks as if their feelings are facts. Racism never gets fixed because White people think people of color are the only victims of it. Racism never gets fixed because whites in power have been able to convince poor whites, that people of color are the reason they are in the financial and social predicament they're in. Racism never gets fixed because White America doesn't invest in ridding America of racism. The bottom line is racism never gets fixed because people do not understand that racism was perpetrated on purpose, therefore it must be un-done on purpose. Racism isn't just going to go away because of a moving speech. It will take love, desire, money and White people willing to take a backseat (until they acquire real knowledge) to people of color, in regards to moving people from racist to non-racist to anti-racist.

When a new boy comes to their school, jealousy and envy cause problems for the five best friends known as the English Roses.

Don'tcha just hate the way you get caught up in stuff without really wanting to? Then it goes a bit further, and suddenly you're one of those jerks you hate because . . . you can't be trusted. ROSE WANTS NOTHING MORE THAN TO GET AWAY. Last year she'd had it all: pre-law in the fall, a budding romance, and her best friend, Zoe. Now Zoe will never forgive her, her family is crumbling, and the secret that's been boiling up inside her is bubbling a little too close to the surface. All Rose needs to escape are an old van, her surfboard, the road, the ocean, and . . . mom? When Rose's mother jumps in the passenger seat right as Rose is about to set off, her trip takes an unexpected turn, filled with nagging memories of last year, and the looming scandal that refuses to be ignored. A twisting plot that keeps you guessing, told from the viewpoint of a realistically flawed yet snarky main character, makes this a book that just can't be put down.

In 1327, finding his sensitive mission at an Italian abbey further complicated by seven bizarre deaths, Brother William of Baskerville turns detective.

Unravels Umberto Eco's classic mystery novel

Beauty Meets Beast in San Francisco Accepting employment as a governess after hard times hit her family, medieval scholar Rosalind Hawkins is surprised when she learns that her mysterious employer has no children, no wife, and she is not to meet with him face to face. Instead, her duties are to read to him, through a speaking tube, from ancient manuscripts in obscure, nearly-forgotten dialects. A requirement for the job was skill in translating medieval French, and she now understands the reason for that requirement, and assumes her unseen employers interest in the descriptions of medieval spells and sorcery is that of an eccentric antiquary. What she does not realize is that his interest is anything but academic. He has a terrible secret and is desperately searching for something that can reverse the effects of the misfired spell which created his predicament. At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).

What happens when a former Zen Buddhist monk and his feminist wife experience an apparition of the Virgin Mary? “This book could not have come at a more auspicious time, and the message is mystical perfection, not to mention a courageous one. I adore this book.”—Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit Before a vision of a mysterious “Lady” invited Clark Strand and Perdita Finn to pray the rosary, they were not only uninterested in becoming Catholic but finished with institutional religion altogether. Their main spiritual concerns were the fate of the planet and the future of their children and grandchildren in an age of ecological collapse. But this Lady barely even referred to the Church and its proscriptions. Instead, she spoke of the miraculous power of the rosary to transform lives and heal the planet, and revealed the secrets she had hidden within the rosary’s prayers and mysteries—secrets of a past age when forests were the only cathedrals and people wove rose garlands for a Mother whose loving presence was as close as the ground beneath their feet. She told Strand and Finn: The rosary is My body, and My body is the body of the world. Your body is one with that body. What cause could there be for fear? Weaving together their own remarkable story of how they came to the rosary, their discoveries about the eco-feminist wisdom at the heart of this ancient devotion, and the life-changing revelations of the Lady herself, the authors reveal an ancestral path—available to everyone, religious or not—that returns us to the powerful healing rhythms of the natural world.

When Hurricane Katrina swept everything from its path, Peggy Martin's famous rose garden was left under 20 ft of water and mud. Everyone thought nothing would recover. But after the water receded, a singe no-name old-fashioned rose stood alone. The rose finally earned a name and brought hope to all for miles around.